


Darling Boy

by ironfamjam



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony Stark-centric, but only kinda, inspired heavily by the quote when he meets death he greets him like an old friend, introspective
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-08-27
Packaged: 2020-09-27 17:11:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20411362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironfamjam/pseuds/ironfamjam
Summary: Everyone's fates are written in the stars and Life and Death carry out their duties, never interfering.Until Tony Stark.“It’s time now isn’t it?” Tony looks at Death, eyes pleading, broken, bright, “Aren’t I done yet? What’s thepoint?”Death sits down next to him, smelling like the earth after rain, embers turning to ash, the salt in the ocean. “Darling, your story isn’t over yet.”“Whynot.”“How can a story have an ending without a compelling middle?”





	Darling Boy

**Author's Note:**

> I think Tony's journey through the struggles of self-love and wanting to be alive is relatable for a lot of us and I just wanted to explore that in a more literal sense. 
> 
> And I also love that JK Rowling quote.

Tony is fourteen and angry and miserable and wretched when he meets Death for the first time. There’s a bruise on his cheek from where his father back-handed him after he mouthed off. His mother’s half-hearted urging rings in his ears. His tears run down his neck, hot and unforgiving. 

He stumbles against the wall, head spinning. He can smell the alcohol everywhere. It’s in his throat, it’s on his lips, it’s sticky on his shirt, wet on his fingers. It’s in the bottles, one clutched in his hand, five scattered around him. He laughs.

Big mess. He made a biiiig mess. Everywhere, everywhere. Bad. Bad.

_He’s_ bad. 

A mistake.

That’s what dad said. And dad was supposed to be the smartest man in the world. Dad helped end the war. Dad helped save the world. Dad was Captain America’s best friend. Dad knew everything. 

He didn’t know Tony though. 

Except maybe he did. Maybe he really was a screw-up. A waste of parts. 

Tony looks at his hands, made of flesh and blood and muscles and bone. He’s not a robot, there are no wires to fix if he’s faulty, no circuit boards to replace. He is only a hurt soul with a fragile heart he pretends doesn’t exist at all. 

So he drowns it. 

He takes another sip, he feels his stomach lurch. He feels cold, cold, cold, he wants to buried in the snow. Then his dad would never find him- too inconvenient to look. Tony’s head spins. He twirls and twirls. Somehow the floor ends up at his cheek. Something disgusting burns his nose, his throat feels like it’s on fire. 

His eyes flutter shut. 

He can’t feel anything anymore.

He’s done it. He did it. He escaped. 

He can’t think anymore.

When Jarvis finds him, Tony Stark is breaths away from no breaths at all. 

Faintly, Tony can hear the buzz of a hospital, beepers, and monitors and tools clattering around. But he doesn’t want to embrace existence, would rather just be numb. 

But he looks to his right and sees…not a someone, but a something. More important than a someone. Too sentient for a something. Realer than his tears. “It’s not your time yet Tony.” the someone-something says and Tony knows it’s Death. 

But why should Tony be humbled? He’s faced off the most powerful man in the world. What could scare him anymore?

“I don’t care. You can’t stop me.” 

Death seems almost amused; if a state of existence can be as such. “You have more to lose Tony Stark. More to gain. You can try to fight your fate,” Death’s fingers are on his face- they feel like feathers, they feel like the sun, they feel like the breath of your mother on your cheek when she held you for the first time, “but you will lose little darling.”

“I don’t lose.” Tony retorts and wonders why the longer he stays, the calmer he feels. 

“Then you’ll see me again. But today, that’s all for now, Life is waiting.” 

And Death leaves him and it’s colder than Tony ever thought it could be and his eyes lurch open as he gasps. Jarvis takes one look at him before his lip pulls, trying to quash his tears. “Sir, you’re back.”

Tony looks around like he could find what he was looking for before turning back to his only friend. He wants to say he’s sorry. 

But he doesn’t know how.

When Tony’s twenty-two, he’s hit by a car. 

He’s crossing the street, irate at yet another small inconvenience, angry mostly at himself, the left-overs of grief still in his mouth when a car ignores the red light and Tony rolls over the hood, toppling to the ground. 

He hears something crack, the reverberation shatters through him. He feels his blood beneath his cheek, it’s sticky, wrong. He can hear people screaming, the thudding of foot-steps everywhere. Someone’s trying to touch him, but they’re so afraid they pull away. “Call nine-nine-one!” someone screams. 

Too late, Tony thinks. Too late.

You have more to lose and more to gain Death said. 

The pain rocks through Tony’s veins, he feels like every atom is splitting inside him. 

It’s nothing. Compared to the guilt that rocked him when his parents turned up dead on a side of a road. 

It’s nothing. Compared to the joy in his battered heart when he saw Rhodey’s genuine smile for the first time.

What more could he lose? What more could he deserve to gain? 

People beg him to stay awake, to hold on just a little longer, help is coming, help is coming. But Tony knows, it’s his time now. 

It’s time. 

There’s no helping him now. 

Death isn’t pleased to see him. Not at all, “What did I say to you?”

Tony doesn’t understand. “It’s time now isn’t it?” 

He looks at Death, eyes pleading, broken, bright, “Aren’t I done yet? What’s the _point?_”

Death sits down next to him, smelling like the earth after rain, embers turning to ash, the salt in the ocean. “Darling, your story isn’t over yet.”

His voice cracks, “Why _not_.” 

“How can a story have an ending without a compelling middle?” 

Tony’s eyes are wet and aching.

“When you were born, I watched Life place you in the arms of your mother. She laughed when she saw you, her joy was pure. Your father held you in his arms and vowed to love you eternal.” 

Tony scoffs, the familiar bitterness swelling inside him. 

“But then you grew and your father wasn’t there.” Death says, and maybe Tony’s imagining the sadness, the empathy, “You cannot choose your beginning or how it will end. Life gives you the first, I give you the last. But only you, can do everything in between.” 

“You took my parents. You didn’t have to.” Tony whispers, lip trembling, “You could have saved them.” 

“I could.” Death says, nodding, “But I didn’t. It is fate.” 

Tony’s questioned the most powerful man in the world. He isn’t afraid, “What if I don’t believe in fate?” 

Death almost looks to be smiling, “Then I challenge you to change it darling. Maybe you can.” 

Tony wakes up to life once again, in a hospital where so many others are dying, and wonders why he’s still alive when better people aren’t. 

More than a decade later, a missile with his own name on it explodes right into his chest. The shock of seeing bits of metal stick out from his body numbs the thought-shattering pain in his brain. The blood pools over his shirt and even though he’s tried to fulfill his father’s legacy of making the world safer through creating the bigger sticks, even though he’s tried to make something of his middle, Tony knows there’s no way Death can spare him from this. 

It would take a miracle.

But when he wakes, he awakes to his own screaming and fearsome pain- pain like he’s never known. The world fades in and out of focus, everything throbs around him. He’s dying. He’s living. He’s _hurting_. He’s being tortured- he’s being saved. What’s the difference, what’s the difference?

Death takes him out of his misery. Plucks him out of that half-conscious prison that sends electric shocks to his heart and he’s back at the end of the world. “You’re saving me.” Tony states, so close to ambivalence. 

“A very courageous doctor is saving you.” Death answers, “I am but an observer.” in a voice more melodic than an orchestra, more terrifying than a scream, more gentle than a breeze through the trees. 

“Do you ever get tired of doing this?” Tony asks, gesturing to the wide expanse of everything.

“I am not like you darling. There’s no such thing as tired. Only purpose.”

“But don’t you want more than that?” 

“I don’t want for anything.” Death replies.

“Then why are you here? With me. You can’t have time for everyone if you’re sitting around watching me die.” 

Death looks at him, then looks away, “Everything in the universe was made from the elements in the hearts of dying stars. Each life carries a celestial nobility that cannot be ignored. A humility that comes from the earth. But you darling,” Death cups his face again, and Tony feels the rush of history flash in his soul, the imprints of civilizations and triumphs and the deepest griefs, “the universe put more than stars in you.” 

Tony shakes his head, “There’s nothing special about me. I’m just like you. I’ve taken lives. Lives I could’ve saved.”

“You will not die today Tony Stark.” Death declares, “What does that mean for the life you will live now? Will you live for those you wish to avenge? Or will you cower in your middle with no story?” 

“It’s hard to write a story you don’t want to act in.” Tony whispers.

“It’s easy to die.” Death says, voice everywhere, all around, “It’s harder to live, it’s true. But you’ll find meaning in things you never expected, find love in places you didn’t think to look, you will be saddened, and it will bring about your destruction, but it will bring you something sweeter. You will pick up a pen because you must and then find yourself writing furiously, like so many before you.” 

“But you will not die today. I will not let you.” 

“I could’ve been ready.” Tony says, thinking about how much easier it would be.

“Not yet.” 

Tony meets Yinsen and his words change his entire life. He builds a suit. He watches his friend die. He vows for there to be no others. 

He perfects an armor that can change the world. 

He stops a madman. 

Somewhere in there, he thinks maybe even someone like him, someone so deeply flawed and scarred, can do something good in this world. 

You can’t choose your beginning or your end but maybe Tony could make the middle something worth remembering. Something to make everything he’d done atonable. Something to make all the love he’s gained deserving. Something to make him feel like he _matters_ in this world. Something fundamentally _good_. 

If he could stop every calamity and every war, that would be enough. 

Later, he’ll think about all the lives that saw another day and wonders if Death appreciates that or not. But Death told him that purpose made existence. And Tony knows what he’s meant to do now. The reason he’s alive. And understands now, why Life would keep him for just a little longer. 

When the palladium begins poisoning his body, Tony experiences true fear. He goes to sleep praying that he won’t go a world outside the universe. There are still things he needs to do before Death asks for him. People he needs to save. Protections that need to be in place. 

He just needs a bit more time. 

And while he works and works and works for salvation- a cure to keep him tethered to the living- he wonders if Death is proud, that he might finally be starting to value life. 

Just a little.

Because his life means he gets to keep others from dying and that is why he exists. It must be. 

Death doesn’t come to meet him, but he swears he feels a shot of familiar cold when he discovers the element that will save him.

Tony finds a team in the Avengers. Friends maybe. If someone like him deserves more of them. 

He’s fought hundreds of battles by now. He’s helped broker peace deals and treaties, gone all around the world. He’s learned to embrace the softness inside him he’d always been demeaned into hiding. 

His heart is too big, it engulfs the planet. 

He wants to protect the world. Every single person. Every single life. He has a duty to avenge the fallen, defend the innocent. But mostly, he just loves too much. And love he now knows, is what will truly be the death of him.

He flies to the missile without hesitating for even a moment. He latches onto it, zooming upward and knows exactly what he needs to do. What needs to be done. For the world. For life. His life for everyone else’s? 

It’s no contest.

Steve’s words echo in his head, “Stark, you know that’s a one-way trip.” 

He almost wants to laugh. Is this it? Is this the moment? JARVIS calls Pepper. Tony thinks it might be. He’s written something fantastic hadn’t he? Something insane. He’d gained everything. A wonderful girlfriend, two loyal best friends, a team of people who understood each other through their brokenness…a chance to do something right. 

Pepper doesn’t answer. 

But Tony knows he will go with her knowing her loved her. With every part of him. With every fiber of his being. With every part of him that didn’t know he could be loved and love back with such tenderness. 

He pushes his thrusters to the max. He needs to reach the portal. He has to. For the world. For Pepper. 

He’s almost there. He can see the swirls of blue. 

He can feel the pressure of the world around him. Can hear the breaths of his team-mates through the comms. His call fails. He surges through the portal and the world goes still and silent. 

He’s in space. The emptiness of it chills him to the bone. But what he sees terrifies him to a level that is inexplicable. Unspeakable. He’d flown the missile because he’d wanted to protect the world but now he knows that he can’t go yet. Not when he’s seen this.

He can’t rest yet. It can’t end here. 

His eye-lids flutter shut. 

“Not yet.” he says, voice a breath away from pleading.

“Aren’t you tired?” Death asks and Tony tastes metal in his mouth, the sweat intermixed with tears. 

“Yes. But I can’t stop. Not now. I’m doing what you wanted me to. Isn’t that enough?” 

“Darling, this isn’t what I wanted.” 

Death looks at him and the white fades away. Tony swears he feels a hand push him through the portal before he falls to the earth like a meteor. 

He doesn’t think Death saved his life. But in the eyes of the afterlife, there was a sadness Tony didn’t know how to place. Like maybe his ending had already be written, and it was too tragic to talk about. 

But Tony can’t think about that. He’s still right in the midst of everything, with so much more to do.

They’re balanced on beams while dozens of the Iron Legion swarm around them. Pepper is free, but she’s made of fire and serum but Tony wouldn’t care if every time she touched him she charred his skin. Killian is chasing them, he’s coming close. 

Pepper falls, she lands on her back, hanging off a metal slab. Fear courses through Tony’s veins. It’s irrational. Useless. Distracting. But it throbs in his ears, in his heart, in his vision that tunnels right onto her. “Pep, hold on, I got you.” He tries to stay calm but his hand shakes as it extends to reach her.

She strains farther and Tony wants to scream and he wants to curse because she’s too far. She’s too _far_.

“Honey, I can’t reach you and you can’t stay there. You gotta let go.” he urges. He can do this. He can do this. 

_Has_ to. 

Pepper whimpers, afraid, more afraid than Tony’s ever seen her and it breaks his heart, it breaks it. 

“You gotta let go! I’ll catch you I promise!” 

And she looks at him and the terror still hides behind those eyes he knows so well but there’s a deep love there. A trust he has to uphold. 

She swallows hard and Tony knows she’s going to believe in him when the entire dock shifts and she slips right off. Slips right between his fingers.

She screams as she goes down. 

For as long as he lives he will that hear that scream, etched with a knife into his very being. He sees her fall into the raging fires, feels his heart pound, harder and harder. He knows Death has shielded him before, wishes and begs and pleads for Death to come swoop in one last time. Just once more. If there were ever a time that Death would bring him back to life, give it to Pepper. Give every last chance to her. 

Always to her. 

Pepper comes back and Tony knows it isn’t anything to do with him but all to do with the power gushing through her veins, but he wants Death to swear he will never go before her. 

He couldn’t bear it if he did.

He thinks he sees Death nodding. But it’s probably just a dream. 

It’s only a few years after that Tony comes to Death without an ounce of fight left in him. He wasn’t close to dying. He knows that. He knows he was only (only- God, as if that was an only) battered to his core. But the cracks in his heart felt worse than the bend in his ribs and the bruises on his face.

Maybe it was a metaphor then, that Steve smashed the shield into his reactor- his shining heart. Maybe he’d done it on purpose, to show Tony how much he thought of their friendship, if he could shatter the one thing that had kept Tony alive in more ways than one once upon a time. 

He wonders if Steve would have broken it anyway, if he thought it still kept his heart beating.

Tony had raised his arms in front of his face. He thought he knew for certain, that Steve was going to kill him. And in his grief, he called for Death. Begged. Pleaded to be taken before he could see Steve’s face when he dealt the final blow. 

And like Death was listening, Tony’s taken away.

“It’s not your time.” Death says gently, looking like the rain, grey and sorry.

Tony shakes his head and he shakes and he shakes, “I can’t do it anymore. I can’t do this. I hurt Rhodey. I lost Pepper. I almost hurt the kid. I lost my team. I lost someone I thought was my _friend_. I-” Tony looks up, and Death sees who he was when they first met, a broken soul with a broken heart and broken dreams, “_please_.” Tony begs.

“I did _everything_. I gave _everything_. What more can I do?? What more can I give?? My life?” he laughs, bitter and true, “I’ve tried. You know I have. Once, twice, so many times. But none of it _counted_. But now that I’m here, ready, you _still_ won’t take me??” 

Tony’s anger is all consuming, it engulfs him, drowns him, lights him on fire, sinks him straight to his knees.

“You are not angry with me.” Death says, “You are not even angry at him.” 

Tony’s eyes flash, “How do you know! You DON’T KNOW ANYTHING! IF YOU DID YOU’D LET ME DIE ALREADY! LIKE I SHOULD HAVE! BUT YOU KEEP SAVING ME!” 

Death looks like his mother. For just a moment. “Darling, I know you think you’re a tragedy. I know you loved him. That you loved all of them. Which is why it hurts. Life hurts.” 

“I want it to _stop_.” 

“That doesn’t mean you want me.” Death says, calm and true, “You just want better than what you have. And there are better ways for that.” 

“This is quicker.” Tony snipes. 

If Death could laugh, it sounds like waterfalls and a hundred birds taking flight and lightning shattering a cliffside, “Perhaps. But the easiest things are not always the best things. But when you die you die as you are. There are no other chances, to grow and to cherish. Only in life, do you get the chance to change. And a life truly lived is better than a quiet death buried in the snow.” 

And Tony’s reminded of his father. Who would look for Tony here? In the banks of Siberia as a blizzard stormed. He wants to shatter he wants to sob he wants to stop he wants to be hugged. 

“I feel like I’m already dead.” God, he can barely speak.

Death wraps him in an embrace and it’s cold like that day he first woke up in that hospital, “All wounds heal darling. Seek out love in new places. You’ll find the answers there.”

When Tony comes home, there’s a text from Peter Parker. 

_That was so cool Mr. Stark!_   
_Happy told me to tell you I was okay, so I’m okay!_   
_Did we win??_   
_Do you need any more backup? Because I’m available. Any time. _   
_You have my number!_   
_Okay, cool, thanks Mr. Stark! I won’t let you down!_

Tony’s heart is broken right down to the core. But maybe there’s still some good he has left to give. One life he can help instead of ruin. 

He doesn’t think he would ever have talked to the kid twenty years ago. Maybe he’s already changed. 

It takes two and a half years, but Tony comes to learn that Death was right. That love can fill the gaps loss leaves behind. That all rivers of grief cool like lava into new foundations that grow forests and forests of fruit bearing trees. 

Rhodey’s thrived with his prosthetic legs, Happy’s dabbling in love, Tony’s proposed to Pepper, and the kid and him bond over Chinese food and failed tech projects. Life’s different than it was. But it’s good.

It’s good. 

There’s no crime fighting super team and the wounds are still tender, but Tony’s reminded of who his real family is. Who it always was. And he lets them foster his recovery, lets them love him, lets himself love them back with everything he has. And more importantly, he lets himself be happy and he understands now, why we should value Death to give meaning to Life. 

He looks at Peter and thinks about his own compelling middle. Thinks about things like legacy and passing on the torch. Wonders what will live on after he really is gone and thinks no, it’s not enough yet. He still has so much more to give. He’s not ready to leave it behind yet, he has so much to teach him, he wants to watch Peter grow. He’s not ready to be a legacy, he’s still just a boy. 

And then the aliens attack, and it doesn’t matter anymore, what Tony wants and wishes. 

What does matter, is that this is the threat he’s been preparing for since that first moment six years ago. This is what he was fighting for. This is what he needs to protect the world from- he looks beside him. Protect Peter from. 

God, why is he here? 

How is he supposed to focus, when the kid’s _right here_, looking at him with wide trusting eyes, as though Tony was all-mighty and Peter invincible. Kids have a gift; they think bad things can’t be real. That death will never touch them. That their parents can still protect them. That if they’re clever and kind and funny they can make it to the end. 

Peter jumps head-first into battle because he knows Tony’s watching over. Thinks Tony can save him, defend him, shield him from the worst. 

So Tony fights and he fights and he faces the Titan head on and Thanos knows his name and he thinks back to what Death said, about how he’s made from more than stars and hopes that will be enough. 

Thanos stabs him through his kidney. 

The world falls silent. Tony looks to see Peter’s eyes, they’re terrified and Tony knows he’s thinking of his uncle and is so terribly sorry, that he’s putting Peter through it again. But Strange has the time stone and Tony would rather die. So he glowers at the Titan, knowing in his heart that Strange will do the right thing because he was a flawed man with a purpose. 

Kindred spirits maybe. 

He looks back at Peter, wishes he said he loved him. Thinks about Pepper, the baby he always wanted. Thinks about Rhodey, how sorry he is that he left him. Happy, who’s heart he will break. His old team…how he wishes they were here. Now. With him. At the end of the world. 

He looks behind Thanos and sees Death, terrifying and magnificent. Bigger than Tony’s ever seen Death to be. War echoes around them, the beating of drums and foot-steps and Tony looks at Death and feels the fear he knows should have struck him from that first time they met. 

“I’m ready.” he whispers. 

Death doesn’t look at him, “Not yet.” 

Tony doesn’t understand what that means until the time stone is gone and the guilt floors him more than gravity ever could and Thanos disappears and Peter is running to him, helping him up and then the very air shakes and Death almost seems to flicker.

Tony’s eyes snap up. Death trembles and trembles. Can the universe know fear? Can constants know fear? Can existence itself cry at what its creations become? 

For just a second, Tony sees a figure, the colour of countries and roses, sobbing and sobbing. Death strokes Life’s face and Life fades, getting smaller and smaller. 

Death expands and expands and then bursts into wisps of shadow and light and suddenly Titan is filled with dust and Peter is crashing into his arms and he’s crying and he’s pleading and Tony can see that child-like innocence die in his eyes. Peter knows Tony can’t save him. He knows the truth about invincibility. Knows the truth about fear. 

“Please sir, I don’t wanna go. I don’t wanna go. Please.” 

And Tony falls to his knees as Peter’s disappear and he loves him he loves him why isn’t that enough? Why can’t that be enough. What could possibly be stronger than Tony’s love? It burns him it burns him. 

Peter grips onto his shirt and then slowly turns to dust. 

His last words are an apology and Tony knows that it’s he, not him, who needs to be begging for forgiveness, begging for one more chance, but it’s time. It’s time now. Everyone is gone. Everyone is dust. Everyone is dead. 

He clutches at his hand, cries when he sees the remnants of his child. 

But Tony doesn’t disappear. 

He shakes, “No. No. No no no.” he rocks back and forth, gripping his hand tightly, tightly, tighter. Tighter!

He can’t go on. He can’t. It’s time. It’s _time_. How much more can he shatter. How much more can he lose. Find love in other places- he _had_ he _had_. But it’s gone and what if the rest of his heart on Earth is gone too. 

No, this must be the end.

It has to be-

“Not yet.” Death had said and Tony wonders how much the universe must despise him, if everyone else is gone and Tony’s miraculously left standing. 

Tony wishes he were made of earth, so he might crumble into soil and grow into a tree tall enough to reach heaven.

Tony wishes he were made of earth, so that the universe didn’t need him- and hate him for it anyway. 

On a dead planet, Tony rocks back and forth. 

Tony falls unconscious on the ship when the oxygen dips past survivable levels. To his left, he sees Life, to his right, he sees Death. “I don’t have them.” they whisper, “They’re not here.” they say.

Tony doesn’t understand. 

“I’m here.” he thinks he manages to say.

“Not yet.” 

Tony’s tired of hearing that. 

Tired of everything. 

And it doesn’t matter if everyone who dusted wasn’t alive and wasn’t dead. Because they weren’t _here_. And Tony couldn’t save them. He’s already proven he can’t save anyone. 

He closes his eyes and tries to dream of Pepper. 

Instead, he wakes up to the light of the cosmos and the promise of Earth. 

When he sees Pepper’s face, he cries. 

For five years, he does not see Death. Sometimes, from the corner of his eye, he sees Life weeping, hair like the ocean, wailing and wailing. 

He hugs Morgan tighter on those days- he knows how precious existence is. 

So when he sees Peter after _five years_ of missing him and wishing for him and regretting for him, he thinks about all the tears Life shed and knows they’re incomparable to anything he’d felt for the boy in his arms. Peter is everything, he is the world. He is the only the force in the universe that could compel Tony to walk back into a life where he’s forced to confront all the fears of his past. 

He sees Thanos, wonders if it’s true, that maybe the Titan is inevitable. That maybe Tony’s entire life has built up to this moment. That maybe this is why the universe kept him alive so long. And he thinks to what Strange said, one future, just one. And maybe the universe saw Life weeping and Death raging and maybe it saw Tony and saw all the love in his heart and maybe it gave him Peter, to make him into something better. 

Maybe this is his purpose, all along. Maybe he was always meant to save the world. 

The thought is bittersweet.

Because what would he lose? What _had_ he lost? 

_Everything, everything_. 

But what had he gained? 

He looks at his family fighting with all their might. 

_The world_.

And so Tony steals the stones, the gauntlet he’d designed sucks in their strength, the force of the cosmos surges through him and he feels more alive than he’s ever felt and yet also so much closer to death. He knows this is it, his last moments. His final breaths. 

He thinks to Yinsen, thinks he might be proud, of his last act of defiance. 

He tries to think of his family, but he sees the fear in Peter’s eyes and can’t because it hurts too much. It _hurts_. And he thinks about when Peter died and almost helplessly feels the same. _I don’t want to go_.

And how ironic, that now that everything in his life is okay. Now that everyone is alive and where they should be. Now that Tony finally loves himself and accepted his flaws, now that he desperately wants to _live_\- not to save the world or stop a threat- but live for _him_\- he’s choosing to die. 

Willingly.

Consciously. 

Knowing exactly what it is he’s attempting to do. 

And how funny is it, that nothing in the world could kill him but himself? 

His neck arcs back with power, he narrows his eyes, voice hard, “And I…am…Iron Man.” 

His fingers move to snap the universe into salvation when Death appears in front of him, head shaking, “No. Not yet. Not yet.” 

But instead of sounding sure, Death sounds pleading, and for the first time, sounds human. 

Tony stares and they’re back in that white place, on the edge of everything. 

“I don’t understand. Isn’t this why you kept me alive all this time? Isn’t this what I’m _here_ for?”

Death’s head shakes and Tony sees tears.

“But you told me to exist you need a purpose. I found a purpose- I found something to die for. Isn't this why the universe kept me alive?” Tony demands and he doesn’t understand, he doesn’t. 

"The universe is _wrong!_" Death shouts. 

Death's head shakes, crying and crying, “I wanted you to live Tony. I wanted you to live. For yourself. I wanted you to realize you never wanted to die, you just wanted to live the life you wish you had. I wanted happiness for you. Love and family and purpose.”

“But I did have purpose.” Tony says softly.

“Darling, I never wanted you to think you only mattered because you sacrificed. We do not matter because our deaths were great but because our lives left impacts. I wanted you to realize that you were loved and that it was your love that helped others in return. You are more than your sacrifices Tony Stark.” Death’s voice drops like thunder, like the sun on your skin, “And I won’t have you die for another.”

Tony shakes his head, “It’s too late. I already have the stones.” 

“_No_. Admit it! Admit you don’t want to die!” Death commands but Tony's faced down the most terrifying man in the world and he yells right back. 

“I have to do what’s right! It’s my responsibility!” Tony shouts, “That’s my family out there, my friends. I can’t let them die. Not them.” 

“_Say it!_” 

Tony’s lip trembles, eyes like a storm, “What do you want me to say?? That I want to leave my wife and daughter?? That I want to die in front of Peter when I just got him back?? That I want to see my best friend hate himself for not saving me one last time? That I never want to see my team finally get the happiness they all deserved?” Tony’s voice cracks, “That I don’t want to die?” 

Tears glitter in his eyes and Tony barely remembers how to speak, “I didn’t know what being happy was like until I made a new family.” Tony thinks of their faces, the warmth in his heart, “I don’t want to leave them.” 

Death stares at him, “What do you want Tony Stark?”

“I want to live.” Tony whispers, before he looks Death in the eye and yells and yells, “I want everyone to live! I want to be alive and I want to meet you at the end! The real end. And not like this. I’m tired of this.” 

Death smiles like a sunset and from behind, Life emerges looking healthy and beautiful like a woodland untouched. Life walks towards him, kisses him gently on the forehead, and whispers, “You wonderful boy, you brave, brave man.” 

And when Tony snaps his fingers, the stones glow and glow and he crumbles to the floor.

And when he opens his eyes, he’s surrounded by everyone he loves in a hospital room he doesn’t recognize. 

Peter’s eyes are watery when he smiles, squeezing his hand tight, “We won Mr. Stark. You did it. You did it.” 

And Tony knows something extraordinary has just happened. Knows he cheated fate. Because his forehead is still warm from Life’s kiss and he feels like he’s been reborn and he knows now, what it means to be alive. That he wasn’t just born to die for the sins of others. 

Decades later, when Tony’s older and greyer, he looks out the window of his small cottage home and watches the sunlight glittering on the lake. He glances at his shelf, at all the pictures on the wall. There’s Happy and May’s wedding, Peter graduating college, Morgan standing proudly at her first art exhibit, Rhodey and his daughter Lila. There are hundreds of more photos in albums, thousands of memories and bits of laughter and tears that dried. 

Death appears on his bed, looking like sunlight and feeling like a breeze. “Hey, long time no see.” Tony smiles, stretching to reach his glasses and put them on, smiling at Death like an old friend. 

“You know I have no concept of it, but tell me, in all this time, are you happy now?” 

“Every day.” 

“Have you lived a good life?”

“Better than a dream.” Tony grins. 

Death smiles, “Then you know why I’m here.” 

Tony nods, moving slowly off the bed, feeling more limber than he has in years. He stretches, groaning in satisfaction, “This is pretty great honestly, that’s the first time I’ve gotten up and my back hasn’t cracked in years.”

Death almost seems to laugh, “Well we have quite the journey. You’ll need the energy.”

“Thank you.” Tony says suddenly, “For everything.”

Death just looks fond, “I challenged you once, to see if you could change your fate. But you picked up the gauntlet anyway.” 

“But you saved me.” Tony says, something knowing in his smile.

“But I saved you, my darling little boy.” Death agrees and Tony knows that what changed his fate was love.

Death holds out a hand and Tony takes it.

“Come now darling, It’s time.”


End file.
